10. Este #2
“Hell, I should play realtor at the diner more often.” I pop open a decent bottle of champagne and celebrate at my kitchen island. “I’ve got a glass raised, and I’m toasting to big money!”
“I’ll motherfucking clink clink clink to that, my friend!” Mallory is outrageously happy for me, like the best friend she truly is.
She begged me to become a realtor years ago, and I obliged, but I do only enough to keep my license up to date.
I prefer being her assistant—I’m happy to sit at her open houses, show homes occasionally when Mallory is slammed, and answer questions on her behalf while working flexible hours at the office.
While I don’t usually run into the perfect buyers for the ideal house while eating brunch on a Sunday, I call that one a happy accident, just like running into Dom in the creek recently.
“So, date with the boyfriend tonight?” Mallory asks, her tone of voice suggestive. I can picture her arched eyebrows and the little wink she’s likely sent from afar.
“First date, technically. Or tenth. Depends on how you look at it.”
“Because dates are a few hours, and you’ve already spent a few days together?”
See, Mallory gets it—girl math.
“Dom did cover Reed and me with his body while a potentially devastating tornado barreled nearly overhead. If I weren’t going to give him the benefit of the doubt after he helped save Reed and Sam from the campground, I sure would’ve after he saved us from the tornado.
It was such a close call, I can’t stop thinking about it.
” I shiver in recollection as the sweet, bubbly champagne plays on my tongue.
“For which I would fellate him endlessly.” Mallory has no shame, and I nearly choke on my champagne. I cough so hard that the liquid goes flying all over the island, and I clear my throat several times.
“Jesus, Mal, you almost killed me. You say the damndest things. How are things going with Jamie? Do you fellate him endlessly?” I can barely bring myself to say the word “fellate,” nor am I convinced I want to hear Mallory’s answer.
I grab a paper towel to clean up my mess and wipe down the front of my shirt. Since it’s wet, I yank it over my head, toss it, and perch on a high-backed stool in my bra.
Mallory cackles wickedly, so I know the answer is “yes.”
“You don’t even want to know. I’ll wake him up with a blow job, that’s how addictive this man’s dick is.
I can’t keep myself away, and he has me coming for hours, girl.
Literal hours in one day! I think we had sex for six hours on Monday night.
I was still awake at dawn, dehydrated and dying for more! ”
Thankfully, I haven’t taken another sip of the bubbly alcohol, so I have nothing to spit out when I giggle along with her. I’m happy for her and the carnal pleasures she’s enjoying with a man nearly as gorgeous as Dom.
“I’m not sure if I was ever addicted to Cole’s,” I confess in a low, guilty voice. “I mean, I had one experience with it before I wound up pregnant, and it took a while not to equate sex with life-altering consequences. Like it was something naughty.”
“It’s important to be obsessed with their dicks, if only for the first few years. If you don’t have that chemistry, what do you have when reality knocks and shit gets real? Like, really real?”
“Responsibility,” I admit. “Shared responsibility. That’s what Cole and I were left with.”
I don’t speak ill of the dead, so I don’t tell Mallory that Cole wasn’t the most giving man on planet Earth. That I often preferred a vibrator over him or a hot bath and my fingers.
“So, no hot sex?” Mallory asks, sounding forlorn for me. “For all those years?”
We’ve been friends forever. She knew and adored Cole. Mallory is Reed’s godmother. I heave a sigh. “Listen, he’s gone now. It feels mean to be too specific now that he’s a memory.”
Mallory sighs, too. “I’m sorry. I know how much you miss him and how hard losing him was. You never talked much about what your sex life was like. I hope it’s better for you with Dom. He seems like he’d know his way around a clitoris.”
I sputter my champagne again, this time dribbling it down my chest. “Mal, warn me you’re going to say shit like that! I keep spitting my champagne all over myself and the kitchen. And what exactly makes you think that about Dom?”
“Honey, come on. He’s hot. Super hot. He’s got big, strong, calloused hands.
He just looks like he’d be a sex god, what can I say?
A hunch. I’m excited for you. I’m pulling in the driveway now, and I’ve been naughty texting with Jamie for hours, so I’m going to hop on his joystick.
You should do the same with Dom later. Why wait when you know it’s right? You do know it’s right, right?”
“I do,” I confess, acknowledging this for the first time.
When the doorbell rings, I check the camera pop-up on my phone and see Dom standing there. He’s early!
“Okay, gotta go, Mal. His ears must’ve been burning because he’s on my porch. Have fun with that joystick.” I hang up and throw the front door open, wearing nothing but a pencil skirt and a nude push-up bra.
I pull him through the door and shut it behind us before Dom manages a word. Reed is due any moment because of early release, so I yank him into the kitchen and hand him the bottle of champagne.
“Shirtless drinking before 5 p.m., huh?” Dom grins at me and then puts his lips on the bottle and takes a long swig.
“Celebrating the gigantic check Mallory is going to put into my account. I was on the phone with her, and she was so crude that I kept sputtering my champagne everywhere. Do I have any on my face?”
Dom gets close and wipes my chin with his thumb. “Got a little somethin’ here…” he trails off and glances down at my half-exposed breasts. “And maybe here, too.”
He dips his head, and I lose myself in the heady sensation of his tongue dragging along my throat and collarbone, licking the remnants of sweet champagne from my skin.
I’m hopeless to do anything but grasp his hair and moan as he takes long, leisurely licks and then traces sweet kisses up the side of my neck, sending tingles down my spine.
Goosebumps pop on my arms as I both shiver and melt for him at the same time.
We both lose our composure. Something in me snaps, and I realize I need him desperately.
As I jump up, Dom catches me, and I tighten my legs around his waist. I drop my lips to his and slide my tongue into his mouth, needy as hell.
Dom presses me against the nearest wall as we make out desperately, his fingers sinking into the plumpness of my ass, holding me tight.
I’m about to undo his belt when I catch a flash of something outside the glass pane of my front door.
Reed.
I gasp into Dom’s mouth and beg him to put me down a millisecond before Reed strolls in the door. I’m still pulling my shirt back on when she greets me.
“Hi—oh God!” Reed looks up from the book in her hands to see me still boxed in against the wall by Dom.
“Okay, listen, you two. You’re grown ass adults, so stop looking so damn guilty.
If you want to sleep together in your own house, I’m fine with that.
Let’s not live in illusions. I know you two are getting it on.
While I’m at it, talking about illusions, Mom?
I have something I can’t hold in anymore.
Sorry it’s so abrupt and stuff, but I can’t wait another second, okay? Mom, okay. Here it is…I’m gay.”
Reed runs up to her bedroom before my mouth has even closed from her stunning confession. I wrack my memory for signs, signals, anything that should have led me to realize my daughter liked other girls, but I come up empty.
“Do you need me to leave?” Dom asks suddenly as I stare up the Juliet balcony to Reed’s door.
“No. I don’t—I don’t know. I’m so confused. This feels out of left field.” I sit down in a chair and heave a long sigh. How am I so taken aback by learning about Reed’s sexuality? Am I a terrible mother? How have I overlooked this fundamental fact about my child?
I stare at Dom, bewildered. “Well, she did say boys were twits. I just assumed she meant high school boys, and she was waiting for college to start dating.”
Reed pops back out of her room, and I jump up and meet her at the bottom of the stairs. “Reed, honey, it’s a quarter into a new millennium, and I absolutely support you no matter whom you’d like to date. How long have you known?”
Reed gives me a sympathetic look as she stops midway down the stairs.
She pats my shoulder. “Listen, I’ve liked girls since I was a kid.
Just never wanted to get bullied at school.
I mean, it’s Texas after all, and they’re not exactly kind to gay kids.
I tried to like boys, I really did. Thought it would be easier, and it would make Dad happy.
Now that he’s gone, I can finally admit it.
I don’t like boys. Not like that. Zero interest. I didn’t know if you would be happy about it?—"
I reach out and hug her tightly before she passes me on the stairs.
“What makes me happy is you being exactly who you are. And if anyone messes with you at school, I’ll hunt them down.
Bullying won’t go unanswered, okay? Tell me if it happens, because I’ll always have your back.
You’re my little girl, and I’m so glad you finally shared this with me. Of course, I support you.”
“Me too. And I’ll also have your back.” Dom walks closer to us as Reed shuffles herself out of my arms. “And I know a thing or two about fighting if you ever need some self-defense skills or to learn how to throw a good punch.”
Reed gives Dom a genuine smile. “Thanks, Dom. I wouldn’t mind a tutorial. Look, I gotta go. I have practice soon, and Daisy is already in the driveway.”
I catch my lip between my teeth. “Look, babe, just be careful with your heart. Not everyone will treat it as preciously as you deserve.”